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Topic: Does it matter who says MMGW is happening? (Read 7781 times)

Yes we know the CO2 variable has increased. Yes we know that will trap more heat. Yes we know that will increase the temps if all other variables are constant. What we don’t know is the output of the Sun. Surely it has some variability over time (there is a cycle of sun spots); most everything is cyclical. The Sun is the main driver in the whole system, the source on the input energy. The temperature inside a greenhouse get’s pretty darn cold without the Sun’s energy coming in. The Sun is a first order variable, CO2 is maybe a 10th order variable.

You are right that solar input is the "main driver of the whole system" but it is relatively constant. From the data I've seen, CO2 correlates very closely with temperature of the atmosphere. So it seems to be CO2 that is the first order variable. The solar output is not the driver of observed change in temperature. That is the main point of the link I opened with. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/30/opinion/the-conversion-of-a-climate-change-skeptic.html?_r=4&pagewanted=all This same conclusion has been reached by the great majority of climate scientists but in this case came from Muller, a former opponent of the CO2 theory.

Just to reply to some of your comments...(sorry, I have't figured out how to excerpt quotes correctly, so highlighted your comments in blue)

Nothing wrong with doing it that way, but if you want to have the quotes backgrounded in blue you just add quote and /quote in brackets. You have to do it in pairs. Whatever is between the two will appear as a quote.

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Do you think that climatologists just forgot to consider natural change as a component? Of course not.

The problem is the MM aspect never seems to be presented as just a component of climate change. It is presented by proponents as THE reason for current climate change. Definitively. No more discussion needed.

What you haven't seen is the discussion that goes on both in published papers over the last 20 years and the discussions between the scientists themselves. What you DO see is "discussion" presented in the popular press and in forum postings like this one. People who purport to be scientists claim in public that they have proven climate change theory to be wrong. And people hear that and believe what they want to for ideological reasons. But that "science" usually does not make it into journals because it is junk science.

You are correct that real scientists are generally not interested in participating in a public discussion which they know is driven by oil company money. Of course real scientists are motivated by grant money as to what research fields they pursue but that generally does not cause them to come to inaccurate conclusions. (That is a quick way to find yourself with no job at all.) The availability of grant money tends rather to push scientists into certain fields of research. I know this because it was true for the grants I have gotten as a biochemist. But climate change in general is well funded so even that is not an issue.

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There are multiple agendas in play here - environmentalists, Politicians, Scientists, Academics, industry, all have their potential gains and agendas. The issue has become highly politicized. Why? Because there is so much to be gained.

Yes you are right. And when they disagree, I listen to science. What we do about the conclusions of science is a political issue, and legitimately so. But in this thread all I'm saying is that the science has shown MMGW is real. Accept that and then have a public discussion about what (if any) actions to take. But claims that the science is phony and driven by self interest on the part of the scientists is wrong. Only a small number of scientists (usually the old ones or those who were not very good to start with) have jumped for the money offered by the Koch brothers. Muller is unique in switching sides after he took the money. Honestly, I won't believe anything he says because I do think he is for sale. But that is the title of the thread. :-D

So Frameshift, what would you have us do? How would you solve the problem?

I believe we are making progress in the USA. Slowly, but going in the right direction with more emphasis on energy efficiency across the board. How much further would you go?

I remember the Shah of Iran on Meet the Press in 1971. He said something I had not thought of before that and it's more true now that ever before. Oil is too valuable to burn as a fuel. The same is true of coal. Those long chain hydrocarbons are valuable as chemical feedstock and for making plastic, pharmaceuticals, etc. etc. It makes sense in the long run to stop using those as fuels. That would also contribute to reducing carbon emissions leading to MMGW. Switching to natural gas is a short term help. It releases only half the carbon per BTU that coal does. The problem is that methane, the major component of natural gas is a greenhouse gas itself. So if we move to natural gas to replace coal, we have to have strict standards to prevent leakage of the gas as it is transported to the burn site.

For a long run solution, I would use wind and solar. We should start doing that now, on a large scale. But to make the transition complete, we need better batteries. So the most important thing I would do now is to push research into battery (large capacitor) research. Large efficient capacitors tied to solar and wind generators is the real solution.

Detroit has been saying for 20 years that the electric car is not going to replace gasoline until there is a battery break through. I’m sure your chemical training tells you that is it impossible to get the energy density out of a battery that we get out of a liquid fuel like gasoline because most of the reactants (Oxygen) for gasoline we get from the air. With a battery, you have to carry all the reactants (sans Zinc Air) and that is a weighty and low energy density solution. Electrical power avoids the Carnot cycle losses of a thermal engine, but the net effect is still something that isn’t competitive with gasoline.

I absolutely agree with you that oil is too valuable to burn, but what you’ve given us as a solution really doesn’t exist right now. How is your solution different from what industry is currently pursuing? Detroit has been researching and working on batteries for 20+ years. Super caps for maybe 10 years. Fuel cells for 10+ years. Everybody knows there is big money to be made if you can replace gasoline, but nobody has done it yet. It isn’t easy.

People have been researching oil producing algae since Carter funded that program years ago. Cellulose ethanol in recent times. Still costs more to make bio fuels than drill for crude.

As for Windmills, Boone Pickens spent billions on windmills but now says they’re not cost effective with NG selling under $3 per mbtu.

You mention “long term” solutions (and I agree with you), but I always get the impression that the MMGW proponents claim we need to act YESTERDAY in order to avoid a catastrophe. Do you think we can wait for the long term, or do we need to take more drastic action now? If not, what do we do in the here and now?

Opps, my bad; you did say we should start doing large scale solar and wind NOW. OK, but is it really wise to spend a bunch of money (tax dollars we don’t have) implementing something based on an inferior technology or is it better to spend all that implementation $$$ on pure research to find a superior solution? This idea of using existing solar technology on a large scale seems analogous to trying to build a Intel Core i7 microprocessor out of vacuum tubes.

Only a small number of scientists (usually the old ones or those who were not very good to start with) have jumped for the money offered by the Koch brothers.

and the only real evidence we have of the science being diddled and opposing scientists been throttled, comes from the MMGW side.

warming or not i don't think is the real question, although last i heard was the global warming stopped in 98...but hey, bad man = bad environment, so it's bound to start up again any day!!

the real question is "so what?" we adjust as man has always done. some things will be worse, some better. some people will make it and some won't. that is the way that it is. might take care of that whole obesity thing.....why do we insist that the temp we have now it the temp we should have? it's changed before. why do we insist that the seas stay as they are. they have changed before. why must people save the coast as it is? it is not as it was 1000 years ago.

you can put all the restrictions on 1st world countries you want. it will have no impact on the billions of people who are up and coming in india and china. the only thing accomplished, and it is a leftist agenda, is that you reduce the lifestyle of the 1st word countries. all in the name of "fairness".

BTW...Kyoto failed not because countries were exempted, but because the countries that agreed to it found that it was so expensive and restrictive, they couldn't meet the terms. we were wise to stay out of it.

"you can't keep your home at 70 degrees....and just expect the rest of the world to go along with that".

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.....The greatest changes occur in their country without their cooperation. They are not even aware of precisely what has taken place. They suspect it; they have heard of the event by chance. More than that, they are unconcerned with the fortunes of their village, the safety of their streets, the fate of their church and its vestry. They think that such things have nothing to do with them, that they belong to a powerful stranger called “the government.” They enjoy these goods as tenants, without a sense of ownership, and never give a thought to how they might be improved.....

Opps, my bad; you did say we should start doing large scale solar and wind NOW. OK, but is it really wise to spend a bunch of money (tax dollars we don’t have) implementing something based on an inferior technology or is it better to spend all that implementation $$$ on pure research to find a superior solution? This idea of using existing solar technology on a large scale seems analogous to trying to build a Intel Core i7 microprocessor out of vacuum tubes.

There are two ways to fund the move to solar and wind. The government can spend lots of money to create a market. The government could buy the wind and solar energy for it's own use regardless of price. That would jumpstart the production of current tech wind and solar (which is really pretty good) and support more research as well.

The second way is to let the market work it's magic by itself. But this, as you so cogently pointed out, is not going to happen when other sources of energy are so cheap. So I would start with a tax on gasoline and coal to rapidly make them more expensive than alternative fuels. Then I would, after some years, extend the tax to natural gas. This has several advantages. It relies on markets rather than central planning to make decisions. And it raises money that can be directed to research. But most importantly, it gives a price signal in advance so that the market knows what the price of gasoline for example, will be years in advance.

So I would say something like.... increase the price of gasoline by 50 cents per year every year. And that should be made clear in the law so that auto manufacturers can plan their cars for a high gasoline price. A big problem so far is that when gas gets expensive, car makers start making more fuel efficient cars. Then, before they go on sale, Saudi Arabia drops the price of oil and the cars can't be sold. Then, when the cars have been cancelled, Saudi raises the price of oil again. The sovereign oil states can run circles around the auto makers and they win every time.

So it would be a package of fuel efficiency driven by higher prices, natural gas supplemented and then replaced by wind and solar. That's what I would do and I would start today.

I do not support taxing other energy sources to pay for new ones. If there are so many supporters of solar energy out there,they should pool their money and create that market.Remember when taxing cigarettes was going to do so much to bring down health care costs because of using these funds to pay for cancer patients? However it was the largest tax increase ever on the poor,brilliant planning!!What Constitutional authority does the government have to say I can tax your product to subsidize another. The government needs to stay out of the energy market,every time it is the taxpayer who loses.And raising a tax on one thing to pay for another is the government affecting the market place. Why don't we just ask every man woman and child to forward 50 bucks for the development of clean energy. And if this doesn't do it,why not ask for 100,200?? Perhaps we should tax every kilowatt of electricity or add 3 dollars to the gallon of milk?

So I would say something like.... increase the price of gasoline by 50 cents per year every year. And that should be made clear in the law so that auto manufacturers can plan their cars for a high gasoline price.

brilliant!! no drag on the economy there! i can see it now. semi trucks full of goods with bed sheets rigged to the cab to catch the wind. :-D ought to bring the price of everything right down!

« Last Edit: August 08, 2012, 01:29:17 AM by kathyp »

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.....The greatest changes occur in their country without their cooperation. They are not even aware of precisely what has taken place. They suspect it; they have heard of the event by chance. More than that, they are unconcerned with the fortunes of their village, the safety of their streets, the fate of their church and its vestry. They think that such things have nothing to do with them, that they belong to a powerful stranger called “the government.” They enjoy these goods as tenants, without a sense of ownership, and never give a thought to how they might be improved.....

And a gallon of gasoline can only provide so many BTUs. At that point you need to start making cars lighter. And the least expensive way to do that is with more plastics. Guess where plastics come from. And what about the disposal of these plastics. they can only be recycled so many times. And it can be argued that many times the recycling process consumes as much energy or more than using virgin materials.I guess both sides of the aisle claim junk science on the other,you know ,making the science fit the outcome we are looking for.

How many tons of pollutants does one volcano spew compared to what man creates?...

Evidently volcano's spew quite a few pollutants if 1816 (the year following the Tambora volcanic) eruption and also known as the year without a summer is any indication. An atmospheric phenomenon observed in New England in 1816 was known as "DRY" fog. Want to make book on what "DRY" fog really is?

There was supposedly so much "DRY" fog in the air that you could stare at the Sun for long periods without damaging your coronas and you could watch Sun Spots race across the Sun's surface with unshaded eyes.

I also found it telling that one of the DuPont Corporation's early proposals to fight MMGW was to float furnaces burning high sulfur coal in the upper atmosphere to create (man made) acid rain thus essentially creating the same conditions that cooled the Earth and led to famine in 1816. This brings two parody song title ideas to my mind. "When Will We Ever Learn" AND "The Pollution Man Can."

perhaps the world is designed to stay in balance no mater what happens. i saw that a volcano blew in NZ yesterday without warning. the entire pacific ring is rockin. i have noticed in the last few months that earthquakes seem to have picked up all the way around.

while the global warming folks worry about rising seas taking the beaches, God may just knock those beaches off like scored glass :evil:

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.....The greatest changes occur in their country without their cooperation. They are not even aware of precisely what has taken place. They suspect it; they have heard of the event by chance. More than that, they are unconcerned with the fortunes of their village, the safety of their streets, the fate of their church and its vestry. They think that such things have nothing to do with them, that they belong to a powerful stranger called “the government.” They enjoy these goods as tenants, without a sense of ownership, and never give a thought to how they might be improved.....

that's the worst idea ever conceived... Raising our costs for gas even more... What is the government really doing with the high taxes they are already charging on gas? Funding other gov programs that don't work. cut the size of our government to the same level it was in 1995 and most of our problems would be solved. Why overcharge ourselves for the gas we have? It's a finite resource, let's use what we have and not destroy our economy even more by taxing the heck out of it. Creating an artificial emergency situation when our country is already in poor shape is just stupid. We are a small part of a global equation. The world doesn't play by our goofy liberal ideas, we can't either.

that's like having a warehouse full of food and starving because instead of eating the food in the warehouse, you say it's too valuable and try to figure out out to make rocks edible instead. What happens when we figure out that mass wind turbines are changing our climate because it's disturbing the jet stream or that all those solar panels we've put out absorb so much heat that earths too hot for us still? What about the environmental impact of making solar panels? What about when ducks become extinct because they've all been chopped up or the reflections from solar panels have thrown off their migratory patterns?

we know the problems with oil and we know what precautions to take. We also know that everyone else in the world will do whatever it takes, the environment be darned to suck every last drop of oil out of the ground and every last cent out of our pockets.

the whole liberal idea of its ok to have all the abortions you want, but it's terrible to execute a murderer or upset a crickets routine is just proof that they like to come up with the dumbest ideas possible.

Did you guys and gals know that it is a Federal crime for a gas station to post the various Federal, state, county, and city taxes that are included in the price of a gallon of gasoline? Now many of you think that if Al Gore's United Nations' tax, known as cap and trade becomes the law of this rock called Earth, that the UN's tax will also be covered by this ban?

We all know that the government doesn't want the people to know it makes a lot more from a gallon of gasoline than the greedy people that produced it.It's easy to cast blame if the truth is not known.How dare the oil companies make a few cents a gallon to drill,extract transport,refine and transport again.http://www.gaspricewatch.com/web_gas_taxes.phpHow does your state fair?

... There are two ways to fund the move to solar and wind. The government can spend lots of money to create a market. The government could buy the wind and solar energy for it's own use regardless of price. That would jumpstart the production of current tech wind and solar...

Didn't Kerosene and whale oil only fall from public favor when electricity started doing a better job of lighting and powering our homes, cities, and factories at a lower price? The only person afraid of allowing the market to work is the person or persons pushing an unrealistic product doomed to failure at any price.

If today's alternative energy technology is any indication of tomorrows alternative energy technology, it would be a great mercy to put alternative energy quietly to sleep and spare it the prolonged agony of a natural death. We do the same thing with broker down horses and call it a great good.

Hmm,I don't think Edison and Westinghouse needed government subsidies to electrify homes back in the day. I believe just the competition between the ideas of A/C current vs D/C to rule the market was enough to bring on the electrification. Only did the REA jump in when it was deemed unfair country folk didn't have this new fangled stuff. :-D